May The Circle Be Unbroken: A Song History

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The song began as a gospel hymn. "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?" pairs words by Ada R. Habershon with music by Charles H. Gabriel, and Hymnary.org dates both to 1907.[1][2] Its theme is the hope that a family parted by death will be gathered together again in heaven, and it has gone on to appear in dozens of hymnals.[1] The Traditional Ballad Index lists recordings from as early as a 1913 Columbia disc by William McEwan, followed in the late 1920s by an Edison disc by the Metropolitan Quartet in 1927 and releases by Frank and James McCravy and by the Rev. J. C. Burnett in 1928. The Index also observes that the tune most people know today is not Gabriel's original, and it gives that 1927 Metropolitan Quartet recording as the earliest date for the later tune.[3]

Marion Post Wolcott photograph of a large family gathered on the grass in front of a Kentucky farmhouse, 1940

Marion Post Wolcott, Family reunion on front lawn on Sunday near Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, photograph, 1940. Farm Security Administration collection, Library of Congress. No known restrictions on publication.

A. P. Carter of the Carter Family later reworked the song. His version holds on to the hymn's chorus, but the old verses are gone, replaced by new and more vivid ones about a mother's funeral.[3] According to a University of Pittsburgh guide to the group's music, the chorus tune comes from the hymn while the verses borrow the melody of the Carters' own "Sunshine in the Shadows."[4] The trio had already recorded the song, as "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?", for Victor in Camden, New Jersey, on June 17, 1933, but that take was marked for destruction.[5] Their "Can the Circle Be Unbroken (Bye and Bye)" came out in 1935 on labels of the American Record Corporation, including Melotone and Banner.[6][7] That 1935 recording received a Grammy Hall of Fame Award in 1998.[7]

The song reached a new generation in 1972, when the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band released Will the Circle Be Unbroken, a three-record set made in Nashville the previous summer with older stars including Maybelle Carter, Roy Acuff, Earl Scruggs, Doc Watson and Merle Travis. The Library of Congress added the album to the National Recording Registry in 2005.[8] Among mountain dulcimer players, it appears as "May The Circle Be Unbroken" in Stephen Seifert's Join the Jam, a melody-and-chords book of tunes commonly played at dulcimer jams.[9]

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Sources

  1. Hymnary.org: "Will the Circle Be Unbroken".
  2. Hymnary.org: "[There are loved ones in the glory]" (tune by Chas. H. Gabriel).
  3. The Traditional Ballad Index: "Will the Circle Be Unbroken".
  4. University of Pittsburgh, Voices Across Time: "Can the Circle Be Unbroken: Country Music's First Family".
  5. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix BS-76287. Will the circle be unbroken? / Carter Family".
  6. Smithsonian National Museum of American History: "Can the Circle Be Unbroken; Glory To the Lamb".
  7. Encyclopedia Virginia: "A. P. Carter (1891–1960)".
  8. Library of Congress, National Recording Registry: "Will the Circle Be Unbroken — The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (1972)" (essay by Pete Finney).
  9. Stephen Seifert: "Join the Jam DAD Tuning".